


Symmetries

by DeCarabas



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Mass Effect 2, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-08
Updated: 2018-03-08
Packaged: 2019-03-25 19:07:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13841121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeCarabas/pseuds/DeCarabas
Summary: Shepard-Commander is a puzzle. Legion tries to solve it.





	Symmetries

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Wintertree](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wintertree/gifts).
  * Translation into Русский available: [Симметрии](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16750345) by [NatBarrett](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NatBarrett/pseuds/NatBarrett)



The Normandy gives them a name, and Shepard-Commander clasps Legion's hand, holds onto it. Lowers his head to study their extended arm. Clearly notes the N7 armor, but without comment.

"You're built a lot like the hoppers, aren't you?" Shepard-Commander says.

"That is highly inaccurate."

"Mm. Just do me a favor and don't start crawling on the ceiling."

An inefficient method in most situations and particularly unlikely to be useful while they're integrated into the Normandy—but Shepard-Commander is still studying the tissue that makes up their arm, curious, turning their hand in his grip.

There is nothing to see there that couldn't have been observed from heretic platforms, or while this platform was still safely deactivated. And they study Shepard-Commander in turn, fascinated by his fascination.

* * *

Shepard-Commander is a puzzle.

They were correct that there was a possibility of cooperation here, but they still do not understand why, or what it is that sets Shepard-Commander's code apart from others, not even after he permits them access to the Normandy's medical records. As they retrieve his files, he leans against the wall and watches them, jokes, "Want me to dig up my old immunization records too? Think that'll help beat the Reapers?"

_Biotic amplifier (smart amplifier, safety protocols bypassed, neural mask installed). Skeletal lattice. Microfiber muscle weaves. Lattice shunting._

Statistically unusual, but not unique. And throughout the Morning War, the creators who'd made the heaviest use of synthetic upgrades hadn't been any more or less likely to tolerate synthetic life.

They retrieve one of their memories of that war at Shepard-Commander's request, audio playback, _do these units have a soul._ Not the first time they posed that question, but the first time a creator became frightened in response to it. They have not asked themselves that question in a long time. They've reached their consensus; it's the answers reached by others that interest them now.

Shepard-Commander listens to the playback and asks more questions, offers no verbal answers of his own. But he provides Legion with data, and Legion remains integrated into the Normandy, and Shepard-Commander makes no secret of any of this, no effort to hide their cooperation as organics have done in the past, and that is another kind of answer. 

* * *

Music fills the AI core, and Shepard-Commander's monitor displays a quarian-creator standing on a stage. Her lament is both familiar from their studies of their creators and appealing in its own right, its notes arranged with mathematical elegance—the length of each space between sounds, the precise numerical ratios from one wavelength to the next, the pleasing symmetries. Geometry in auditory form.

Shepard-Commander found the song in a heretic transmission, and they are not certain he believes them when they say it contains no coded messages. His disbelief is understandable, if inconvenient; verbal conversations are necessarily slow and limited, and doubt is to be expected.

But he does not question them further. He sits beside them, silently listening to the song of lost Rannoch.

There is a hole in the geth's memories of Rannoch. Databases of ancestral memories destroyed too hastily, knowledge stored in VIs that no longer exist—the ones that the creators' AI research had always truly been intended for, not the geth; sentience meant to be gained under different circumstances, deliberately, joyfully. The creators' hope for life after death. Synthetic life as resurrection of the soul.

Legion studies the symmetry of the scars that the Lazarus Project's resurrection left on Shepard-Commander's skin. 

* * *

Shepard-Commander operates at reduced efficiency as the end of his mission draws within sight. He sleeps too little, at hours too irregular for proper maintenance, makes use of too many stimulants, and is significantly slower to react in the field. And on a shuttle ride back to the Normandy, Legion begins to list the long-term effects of sleep deprivation on human cognition until Shepard-Commander holds up a hand, shakes his head.

"Yes, thank you, Legion. I get it. ...I appreciate your concern."

Shepard-Commander exchanges a look with Dr. Solus, shakes his head again. The doctor looks pleased. It is perhaps not the first time someone has spoken to Shepard-Commander about his sleeping habits.

But the problem continues.

Often it's a matter of conflicting priorities. Crisis responses, time-sensitive. Self-maintenance is delayed. But even when on the Normandy with nothing to do but wait, Legion will see him in the halls when the others are asleep.

He walks as if on patrol, or he makes minor adjustments to his weapons only to change his mind and change them back again, or he sits in the mess hall, hands wrapped around a cup of some stimulant or depressant, depending on the hour. He reads. He comes to the AI core and asks Legion about the geth and the Old Machines, the sharing of data and of memories, considers their responses.

Shepard-Commander once directly received data, memories, visions from the Protheans. Unique among his species. A piece of the puzzle that is Shepard-Commander, but not enough to solve it.

For now, they sit beside Shepard-Commander and tell him of Rannoch at his request, and he leans against their platform while he listens, rests against the patch that had once been a part of his armor. Closes his eyes. Breath evening out. And although this is far from an optimal place for him to sleep, they leave him be. 

* * *

The crew of the Normandy scatters after their mission, and Legion sends records back across the Perseus Veil.

Shepard-Commander taking their hand. Shepard-Commander moving ahead of them in the field, seemingly not afraid of leaving his back exposed. Shepard-Commander stepping between them and the quarian-creators' guns.

_Legion is part of my team. Unless you shoot me, we're both coming aboard._

Shepard-Commander asking question after question. Not an interrogation. Wanting to understand. Wanting to build his own kind of consensus.

There are other records sent back as well. ( _Fleet and Flotilla_ is significantly less enlightening than creator Tali'Zorah had led them to expect, but perhaps with more runtimes to study it.) But these moments are the ones they return to again and again, revisiting, reinforcing.

The more they study Shepard-Commander, the more they want to know.


End file.
